The need to transmit real-time sensitive content such as audio and video over communication networks has been increasing in recent years and there is a need to secure bandwidth and QoS (Quality of Service) that can satisfy the requisites related to transmission of the content. Particularly in a network environment with limited available bandwidth, when multiple communication devices transmit data with QoS assurance, to avoid collisions between the data, a bandwidth allocation process is carried out to apportion and allocate the bandwidth and time used for data transmission.
If the bandwidth allocation process is initiated after the appearance of data to transmit, however, the start of data transmission is delayed by the time required for the bandwidth allocation process, so users have not been able to enjoy a pleasant communication environment. Technology is therefore needed for shortening the time required for the bandwidth allocation process and providing the user with a pleasant communication environment.
A proposed technique for shortening the time required for the bandwidth allocation process is to preset the time and required bandwidth of a data transmission requested by the user and rapidly allocate the bandwidth needed for the data transmission, which occurs at the reserved time (see, for example, Patent Reference 1).